Reconciliation of Revenge & Remorse
by jamblute
Summary: Ardyn arrives in Niflheim a broken man, finding new meaning in some of what Verstael says... Though he does not want to. What does this mean for his future and the world beyond this facility? (Episode Ardyn spoilers, may someday be continued to include Verstael / Ardyn, redeemed Ardyn, and other shenanigans. Story cover is an official screenshot.)
1. Settling In

Everything was difficult for Ardyn to grasp… He tried focusing on the physical world of wherever those soldiers had taken him after leaving the cave, but suffice to say, the physical aspects of his situation were not appealing. Rough bedding so terrible he kicked it off in his tormented sleep, worthless books, ill-fitting clothes, a desolate landscape… And then there was 'his excellency Verstael' who summoned him. Might as well head out, he told himself aloud just a few minutes ago to fill the deafening silence of such a sterile place. But was it truly worth the trouble? Who would release him from his suffering, knowing what he'd become? Certainly no one he should want to associate with.

Fine orchestral music waited behind the steel double doors, reinforced like all the others. Ardyn sighed and the guard posted at the door acted oblivious to his existence. So he should. Ardyn stepped forward and the doors automatically drew back to let him through.

Verstael brightened the moment he entered, holding his hand out in welcome. "Well, have a seat."

In no particular hurry, Ardyn approached the wooden chair set aside for him. Though there was no plate there, the food set out looked fine enough even if his appetite was conspicuously absent. He reasoned he must be hungry on some level and took the offered seat. Slowly, while his muscles protested at the movement as if the act of getting up from bed and walking down the hall had been taxing.

And yet, thinking back to his fight on the island… No. He put that from his mind before the feeling of infecting a man with Starscourge and absorbing his memories could surface too vividly. Leaning forward with his hands clasped and head lowered instead, Ardyn began the familiar habit of prayer. He would normally go about this in quiet, but something about the empty air of this place compelled him to speak. "Gods above, we thank you for the bounty you have laid before us."

"Mm?" Verstael interrupted, drawing his attention. "Don't want your food getting cold, do you?"

Ardyn simply raised a hand to dismiss his question, and his silent return to his own plate was answer enough for Ardyn. He finished the rest without speaking, raising his head to see Verstael finishing a bite of his own food.

What faithless existence must this man lead, to consume without thanks? How fortunate he must be… After everything Ardyn experienced at the hands of the gods and his brother, his faith felt forced like a familiar vice rather than the safe haven it once was. To live and enjoy without a portion of his mind always on the gods and their blessing? Ardyn was thrilled and ashamed to admit to himself that it sounded like a paradise.

But who was he without the blessing of the gods? Walking in the light of the gods was the hallmark of the Lucis line… Yet here he was, sitting in a lifeless facility with haunted dreams and darkness coursing through him. Was he not already forsaken? Ardyn grimaced at his own train of thought. Surely, there must be a way back to faith and prosperity. Surely…

"Are you enjoying your stay?" Verstael interrupted once more in an attempt to be civil. To what end, he could only imagine.

"No."

"You've been asleep for years. Learning to appreciate the waking world will take time," he pardoned him as if he had any right to, gesturing Ardyn's struggles away with a casual wave of his fork. Reaching for his wine with a glimmer of a smile, his host continued. "Perhaps I can help enlighten you while we dine."

Ardyn had looked away from by then, hearing him taking a sip in a bizarre and unwelcome toast more than seeing it. Questions ate at him now that he was presented with an opportunity to ask. He scarcely believed he could trust this man's answers, but what other opportunity did he have?

"So you examined my body…" He discovered as much simply from the state of his quarters but also the records available there. "Was it fruitful?" Ardyn couldn't conceal the faint trace of curiosity from his voice. He too wanted to know how he came to be what he was now, why, and what it meant for his future. Perhaps not as much as Verstael, alarmingly, but it remained true all the same.

"Oh, yes." Verstael was all too pleased to discuss this, it seemed. He sat back with a smug smile and elaborated. "You're completely different than the daemons I've known. No wonder the Lucian kept you locked away," he concluded with a chuckle and looked at Ardyn with open hunger. For knowledge or power or something closer to his baser urges, Ardyn wasn't certain. And did it matter? He compared Ardyn to daemons he'd studied, a creature he understood needing to be locked away. Who would ever blame him? The horrors he committed in just a few short minutes after being released… Ardyn sat still without a word as Verstael was swept up in his own thoughts, sitting forward with a sharp brightness nesting in his eyes.

"To think the powers of a daemon could dwell within the heart of a man. It's incredible!" He sat back once more, arms wide as if to bask in the light of his discovery. Ardyn wondered if such a passionate expression overcame him in those sun-washed afternoons beneath the tree with Aera when he discussed service to the gods and his fellow man. Was it that passion that Aera loved in him?

"While the daemons infect your body, they also make you stronger. Your cells can regenerate themselves, and you can daemonify other life forms as well." Ardyn felt despair wash over him as real as any tide. Casting his gaze down to the table, the food had lost any appeal it may have held. Infected—that's what he was, and he was an infection as a result.

Not only could he no longer cure others, he spread this plague. What had he done to deserve this? How severely had he displeased the gods when all he had ever wanted, ever done, was to serve them? Somnus had been granted a throne and great prosperity for his petty spite and the mass murder of their people while Ardyn had been condemned to a life of—no. He could not think this way. Whatever the gods decided, it had to be correct. To doubt that was to throw away everything he knew and believed in.

"There's no doubt. You are—"

"A monster."

"Not a monster. A _marvel_," he corrected with such conviction that the piece of Ardyn that wanted to believe in a new purpose for himself was very nearly convinced as well. As Verstael reached forward to him, true admiration in his gaze and smile, Ardyn wanted to accept that praise. His resonant, nearly mad laughter layered with the instrumental music as Ardyn looked up to the ornate lights hanging above.

How he so wanted to believe that this was not a punishment for transgressions, but a new opportunity to carry out another destiny—however dark a destiny it may be. Was it not better than none at all?

"I would like to ask you for further assistance." Verstael had returned his attention to Ardyn, an idea no doubt already formed for what he might do with this 'assistance'. There it was, the ulterior motive. He intended to pay it no mind whatsoever as long as he could.

Brushing his hair aside to lightly massage his forehead and temple to subdue the headache building there, Ardyn brought up another matter. "How long has it been since you brought me here?"

"Two hundred and four days. Roughly seven months or so." At that answer, Ardyn lowered his hand and focused on Verstael. He didn't appear to be lying… Ardyn pushed himself to reach for one of the crescent rolls stacked in front of him as the blond went on.

"Then again, the Lucians had you locked away in that prison for nearly two millennia. It's completely normal if you're losing some sense of time." He acted so engaged in moments like this that Ardyn could nearly overlook his clear selfish interest. More importantly, no amount of examination of the bread was rousing a desire to eat it. Even a monster must eat, and yet… He held onto the roll and dropped his hand to his lap. "You must loathe those Lucians for what they did to you."

His stomach roiled—the first response he got from it since waking. Was that his plan, then? To have Ardyn assist him in the destruction of the Lucians? Preposterous. The imprisonment was Somnus' doing, not his people's. They didn't need to suffer for his brother's crimes.

"Leave me alone," he sighed, returning the roll to its platter. Ardyn could tell what he was after, and he wanted no part in it. …Though that was not as true as he hoped. He wanted to get back at Somnus, to hurt him in ways far worse than he had ever conceived in that tiny, jealous mind of his… But that wasn't Ardyn. It wasn't who he wanted to be or imagined himself being for all those years before… Before now.

"What is this food?" Anything to avoid more talk on the Lucian line and his feelings on them. Maybe a description would transform this nausea at least back to neutrality. A slice of meat presented with a spring of herbs sat beside the rolls and diagonally from that was a platter of greens and floral accents sat piled in a ring of onions surrounded by rays of thinly sliced meat plus a platter of two biscuits topped with cream, berries, and two sprouts of—perhaps it was mint. Two sauces were drizzled beside the biscuits at the outer edges of the platter, but presentation simply wasn't enough to appeal to his appetite or quell the disgust that settled into Ardyn's stomach.

"Meat," he observed of only one dish, pride already apparent in his voice. "Cloned in this facility."

Well, that certainly got his attention. Not in any way he wanted. Ardyn scowled at the very thought of duplicating life for something as simple as a meal—a flagrant disregard for the gods if he'd ever heard of one before. "_Cloned_?"

It was as if he asked about a passion of Verstael's. He supposed he had. Speaking with his hands, a shamefully endearing trait in such a faithless man, Verstael launched into his description. "We cultivated somatic cells, used them as donors to fuse the nucleus-transplant cells to the recipient oocytes, and then we—"

"Oh please, talk in a language humans can understand." But that remark itself seemed to have stopped Verstael in his rambling—a mercy, if Ardyn was to be honest. He sat back in the chair and completely surrendered the thought of this food touching his lips. "What is it you want from me, anyhow? Why did you help me?"

Ardyn fixed him with a stare, waiting for the truthful answer. If he denied a desire to take out the Lucians, he would leave this place immediately. To where, he hadn't the slightest, but the least this man could muster after such a display was offer honesty.

"You said that the gods chose you, but frankly, with powers like yours, I'd say you're nearly a god in your own right." More flattery and more reaching toward him as if this act alone would compel Ardyn to join his side.

"We need those powers that you possess." He flashed him a smile that carried over to his eyes somehow. Of everything Ardyn expected from Verstael, a charming smile was not among them. "With that kind of strength, we could finally put an end to the gruesome war with Lucis."

Well… That was the honesty he demanded. Wasn't that refreshing? A person who would unabashedly use him to his own ends rather than hiding behind familial ties to later murder his fiancée. If Ardyn's fate was to be manipulated, could he not at least choose a puppeteer who would let him see the strings? Ah, but to what end? All that was left in Lucis now was the future. And he was from an era long since past. If Verstael noticed the pained grimace on his face, he either did not care or had the grace not to mention it. Who could say with a man who cared so little for anything outside his own goals?

"You, too, must desire the fall of the kingdom that cast you into exile?" And here was another of his passions, this one so strong as to get Verstael to stand when he leaned over to Ardyn that time.

"It's… already over." Somnus was in the ground, and so was Aera. With a heavy sigh, Ardyn put one hand on the table to push himself to his feet. "My desires are all in the past." With that, he turned from the seat and looped back to the door from which he came. That bed was not a comforting place, but it was leagues beyond this conversation and all the horrid thoughts it brought him.

"The man who wronged you may have died long ago, but his descendants live on to this day." Ardyn slowed to a stop. Somnus… Had children? After daring to strike down Aera in front of Ardyn, sealing him away for thousands of years as some monster… The monster he knew himself to be as well, Ardyn thought with a scowl. After all of these transgressions, he dared to go on and start a family as the first king of Lucis? Live the very dream Ardyn himself had prided himself on achieving in the name of the gods, his people, and a fulfilling life? "Surely you haven't settled your resentment, have you?"

The disdain was plain on his face as he gradually turned to look at Verstael. Ardyn knew as much and did nothing to conceal it. Yet his voice remained perfectly level in his reply. "My feelings have nothing to do with scum like you."

"…Come along." What could he do to dissuade this man from his interest? Nothing, it seemed. He led the way around the table to the opposite end of the room and another exit without waiting a response. And why should he? It was not as though Ardyn had any means across the frozen terrain outside this facility.

Following him out the other exit and around a corner to another set of doors, Ardyn stopped when Verstael paused beside some short pedestal-like device. The memories of those he daemonified suggested it was a control panel.

"This is the fruit of my research—a small portion of it, that is." Lights clicked on in the vast room beyond them, Verstael's voice carrying with a faint echo through the newly lit space. How odd it was to see a fake plant in the corner by the stairs leading further into the room full of books, topographical models of continental maps, and more than he could comprehend at a glance. Like a fake plant could lend this facility the life it so desperately needed. Verstael led and out of curiosity, Ardyn followed.

"I envy you. A human life is too short to truly understand all there is to know about the world."

Ardyn had no answer. He expected to the subject of hatred and scorn, rightly so considering the dark powers he possessed, but open envy? He had been the subject of jealousy for years with Somnus as his brother, but it was for the love of their people and his innate charisma, intellect, and talents as a healer. Yet here Verstael was, honestly professing a longing for an immortal life that brought Ardyn only eternal suffering... What a bizarre man.


	2. Shaken Faith

Exploring his research facility revealed a great deal to Ardyn… Too much, perhaps. He regularly sat on the small couch in the bottom floor and simply stared off into the distance to process all that he'd learned. The sun on his skin was a cause of pain, for instance. To even go outside, he would need to cover himself. A marvel, Verstael said, and yet every new thing he learned made Ardyn feel ever more like a monster.

…Still, the wealth of information Verstael had began to color in more of what may have led the gods to curse him as they had. The War of the Astrals and the Fall of Solheim began first with Ifrit bestowing his power onto a man who would become the first king of Solheim—much like the Lucians. They knew prosperity under this blessing, of course. Ifrit tried to bring their kingdom to ash and the other gods intervened, causing the collapse of the very kingdom brought to rise by their power.

Some details had changed for his kingdom and his own story, but there were common elements he couldn't deny. And desperate for a reason, Ardyn clung to these threads as they led him through all the findings in Verstael's facility. With Ifrit felled and three gods slumbering or sealed away after their massive war, who was to say what could possibly follow a war among gods? Had a similar war occurred when Somnus was chosen by the Crystal without Aera's knowledge? Had they turned on each other then as well, and that schism was to blame for his current condition? Ardyn finally had a passion to pursue and by the Six, did he pursue it.

Where was Bahamut? This was a crucial piece to his own puzzle; he had no doubt of that. But in all those books and recordings, there was scarcely a trace of the blade god. And in all that reading, Ardyn saw Somnus time and time again—as compared to no mention of him at all aside from Adagium locked away on the island Ardyn was found on. The rage buried deep in his heart flared at every new discovery of Somnus in the records. Not content to kill Aera and steal the throne from Ardyn, his envy went so far as to erase him from history itself.

And this practice was continued by 112 kings after him. Ardyn scowled instinctively at the insult of it all. Generations of content peace, raising their children, reading them bedtime stories, playing with them in the light of day as the true first king wasted away crucified in a black pit of a forgotten dungeon. Was there no injury the gods and Somnus would not visit upon him? As he dug into the research, the more Ardyn found himself agreeing with the recordings of Verstael.

It was not Lucis, but Somnus, who meant to one day stand above all others. He gathered his own people into piles to burn them alive for a plague they may or may not have and still, the nation struggled with that parasitic plague under his 'care'. But here Ardyn was, living proof that one could survive with the infection and not see its negative side effects to the extent that were daemonified. Perhaps… He was indeed not a monster, but a sign of progress. Verstael wanted to restore balance to the world without the blessing of the gods and by the work of his own merit.

Ardyn had been convinced he was a madman, and he was still not sure that he wasn't. But he had conviction and purpose that he bestowed upon himself—more than Ardyn had ever possessed for all his riches and devotion to the gods. Maybe… Maybe it was time to consider having faith in himself and the change he could bring to the world with or without the gods. Would that be revenge enough to sate his rage for Somnus' wrongdoing? There was only one way to know if this selfish path to peace and fulfillment was even an option for Ardyn.

As he considered it, his heart still strayed to images of the capital from both the information in the facility and the memories of his victims. To imagine all that prosperity and safety and comfort enjoyed by his own people, the ones he had sacrificed so much for, while he wasted away without even the hope to be released by death?

He slammed the book in his hands shut, dropping it on the coffee table before him with a scowl. What had peace ever earned him? How quick they were to forget that when Somnus sought to purge the ill and any in his path, Ardyn preached acceptance and understanding in the free time that he wasn't spending to visit the sick in their homes and rid them of the plague that would have killed them—either naturally or at Somnus' hands. The Ardyn of the past would choose a peaceful path no matter the personal cost. And what of the Ardyn in the present?

The only thing that had softened the edge of this resentment was the image of Aera in the corner painting in the facility. To pursue vengeance was to insult her memory, but also seek retribution for her murder. Though less enraged, Ardyn was still conflicted. Verstael was correct in that no Oracle could be persuaded to a cause like his.

Footsteps from the staircase behind the couch disturbed Ardyn from his musings. "Fascinating, isn't it? I pored over the ancient texts and found scarcely a mention of you. I barely believed you existed until I saw you with my own eyes." He paused at the base of the stairs, looking over to Ardyn as he crossed his arms. He waited there for only a moment as an unspoken invitation to follow him as he walked deeper into the facility. "With your help, my research is proceeding smoothly. You have my thanks."

And of course, Ardyn followed. His distrust of Verstael had not dissolved, but he felt a greater kinship with him than he had prior. If nothing else, the potential of forging one's own destiny rather than having it granted upon them moved Ardyn enough to hear this man out long enough to distill any other new ideas from his ravings.


End file.
